Back to Arizona

After two and a half months of self exploration and finding myself it was time to visit Left Brain for a couple of weeks and see where things were at.  The day before I left Carriage Manor I was treated to a bloom on my neighbor's cactus...I took this as a good sign.

One of the first things I did when arriving in Minnesota was to begin to claim the land and put down roots.  The soil is not as good as I've had in Wisconsin, but much better than my garden soil in Arizona.

I added a couple of bird feeder areas

This shows the bird bath and the two feeder stations

This shows our little shed by the side of the drive way and the patio blocks we added in front of our patio.

Purple Pig looks happy to be home again

back view of the little garden and Left Brain's bright lime green Kia Soul - I had to relearn how to drive a stick shift

The Purple Pig has special significance to me as it was a gift from my son.  After a new paint job she was placed beneath the hostas in her new abode.

During my stay in Minnesota I got to see my family again and catch up with each others lives.  Since it was very near my birthday I received a sundae with one of my meals...sweet! After finishing the first round of Whole30 it was nice to indulge.

We had a lot of heavy talks during our visit and Left Brain and I received a lot of helpful counseling from Stephanie and Christy during this stay. 

Left Brain volunteered to stop the use of all hard liquor and stick to just beer and perhaps some wine and we both agreed to give this marriage one last chance.  We are both optimistic that we can pull this together and enjoy a satisfying and fulfilling relationship when he comes down on September 30th.

Being the child of alcoholics and having had a previous marriage to an abusive drinker in my first marriage, I finally declared "enough".  It took me 65 years to finally grow a backbone and stand up for myself.  I've always been second choice to the booze and just can't tolerate it any more.  Left Brain has given his full support in this and actually seemed relieved to have had the decision to quit made as an ultimatum for the motivation it takes to stop.

It was an exciting and emotional two weeks and I was lucky enough to have a window seat on the way home and see my new homeland as we approached the airport in Phoenix.  I know some people just see dry parched earth,but to me this is absolutely lovely...it's my home and where I belong. Maybe it's a Jewish thing and I was meant to live in the desert.

After arriving back home in AZ I settled back into my routine and was treated to a birthday celebration at the Osaka Steak House with my Thursday Girls Night Out group. Yeah, that's me in the weird get up.

When we exited the restaurant we discovered that it had been raining for an hour, which in Arizona means flooded streets.

Sandy and I drove around the park and here are some images of Patriot Park underwater.  It was so exciting to be in one of my first monsoon storms.

It's great to be back home, this week the temperatures are staying mostly under 100 so it's great.  Now I have another two months to continue working on myself and getting some more weight off this body.

Long Live the Queen of the Desert...or was that Dessert?